Faithful resistance to Alabama’s HB 56
Alabama’s House Bill 56 is the harshest anti-immigrant legislation yet to pass in the United States. Alabama is now the epicenter of the immigration debate. That’s why, just a few weeks after beginning my work with Church World Service as the Grassroots Coordinator for Immigrants’ Rights, I knew it was important to spend some time in Alabama. I spent much of December in Alabama, returning in January, for meetings with pastors, speaking in churches and coordinating training for organizers. Read Rev. Noel Andersen’s blogpost …
End “Secure Communities,” other such programs
Central to all faith traditions are the principles of the common good, human dignity and love for one’s neighbor. In many of our sacred texts the value of welcoming the stranger is an explicit mandate and primary tenet of our faith as in the Abrahamic traditions where it reads as follows: “You shall not wrong a stranger or oppress him, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.” (Exodus 22:21).
From faith leaders’ letter on Secure Communities. Read more …
When “stranger” means “immigrant”
Bible translations that use the word “stranger” leave open just who that means for the reader. The word “immigrant” now appears in a new translation of the Bible, replacing the word “stranger” or “alien.” This is a concretizing and humanizing improvement of the biblical witness, removing the moral abstraction of “stranger” and depersonalization of “alien.”
Ways you can advocate for immigrants’ rights
Speak out for local, state, and national reforms to immigration and refugee policies to help reunite and keep families together, improve the welcome that refugee receive upon arrival, and build stronger, more welcoming communities.
- Educate your community about how Alabama’s anti-immigrant law HB56 is tearing apart families and communities and urge your local policy makers to oppose any AL ‘copy-cat’ bills in your state.
- Sign up for CWS Speak Out Alerts to receive up to date information on important policy decisions that would impact the lives of refugees and immigrants (less than 10 emails are sent per year).
- Learn how SERVICE SPEAKS can transform your service to refugees and immigrants into policy change.
Work with your local law enforcement offices to stop racial profiling, family separation, and unnecessary detention and deportations in your community. Learn more in the Secure Communities Toolkit, and join others across the U.S. (see map here) by signing up to take action.
MORE “S.COMM” RESOURCES
- Immigration Policy Center November 2011 S.Comm Report
- Faith Letter to End S-Comm
- More S.Comm resources at www.interfaithimmigration.org
MORE RESOURCES
- CWS supports proposed “family waiver” reforms (Jan. 11, 2012 statement)
- DREAM Sabbath Scrapbook
- Bible Migrants Study Guide and Profiles
- “A Process of Peacemaking” sermon on immigration (Jen Smyers 10/2/2011). Text. Audio.
- Scary: Alabama’s Approach to Immigration
- Not-so-Sweet Home Alabama: What people are saying about the state’s new immigration law
- Photos from October 2011 protest in Birmingham of Alabama’s new immigration law
- Alabama’s HB 56 terrorizes school children
- CWS urges U.S. to stop deporting Haitians
- And even more resources
CWS-SOJOURNERS MYTHBUSTER SERIES ON IMMIGRANTS & IMMIGRATION
Myths and misinformation abound when it comes to the topic of immigration reform. In response, Sojourners and Church World Service collaborated on a joint three-part blog series, “Mythbusters.” Originally published here in October 2010, we also are pleased to offer the series in this Consolidated Mythbusters Series document for easy sharing.
OPEN CALL FOR VIDEO, PHOTO, ART SUBMISSIONS
FROM IMMIGRANTS, REFUGEES AND THEIR ALLIES
We’d like to make the CWS network aware of an open call for videos, images, animations, multimedia pieces, music, writing and other art for inclusion. The call comes from Deep Dish TV, a national, independent satellite network linking of independent artists, independent media makers & activists.
Deep Dish is working on a multiplatform (web, tv, DVD) collaborative media project, Uprooted: A Grassroots Examination of the Politics of Migration. Uprooted is a media project that challenges the mainstream media’s “immigration debate” by highlighting the social & economic policies that drive migration.It delves into how migrant justice issues intersect with labor issues, xenophobia, the prison industrial complex, neo-imperialism and more. Uprooted encourages and enables migrant communities and their allies to document & distribute their narratives.
Submissions will be featured on the Uprooted blog, and incorporated in a 10-part series to be broadcast nationally and be distributed to universities, libraries, community organizations and exhibition spaces internationally. If you have project proposals you’d like to see realized, email uprooted@deepdishtv.org to learn more about possibilities for collaboration! Also find Deep Dish on Facebook and Twitter.
